Prior art lancing devices are known by which to puncture a patient's skin and to collect a sample of the patient's blood for medical evaluation and diagnosis. However, separate devices are commonly used to first puncture the patient's skin and then collect the blood sample. An additional device may also be needed to dispense an adequate volume of blood from the collector so as to permit a suitable medical examination of the sample. Obviously, the need for separate lancing, collecting and dispensing devices increases medical costs and reduces efficiency. Moreover, the disposal volume is also significantly increased when separate lancing and collecting devices must be safely discarded. Likewise, the preparation of such prior art devices for use (e.g. arming the lancing device with a removable tissue puncturing needle) may be complicated and require special skill and/or care.
In some cases, access is available to the tissue puncturing needle before and/or after the patient's tissue has been punctured. Therefore, both sheathing and resheathing steps may be required to adequately shield the tip of the needle. In other cases, there is no easy way to reliably isolate the blood sample in the blood collection device from the outside environment. Consequently, an accidental needle stick from the lancing device or the premature expulsion of blood from the collecting device could lead to the spread of a contageous and possible life threatening disease. That is to say, the lack of any protective means or the misuse of said protective means with conventional lancing and blood collecting devices will subject health care workers to increased risk of disease during the handling, use and disposal of such conventional devices.